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The rights watchdog says “failing to see justice done will only hamper aspirations for lasting peace.”
Human Rights Watch says that justice and accountability for crimes committed during Libya’s years of conflict are “key” after the two main rival parties signed a ceasefire agreement.
“Failure to get justice will only hamper aspirations for lasting peace,” the human rights group’s Libya chief investigator Hanan Salah warned on Thursday.
Libya has been plagued by violence since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed veteran leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Since then, the North African country has been dominated by armed groups, divided by local conflicts and divided between two bitterly opposed administrations: the UN-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA), headed by Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj, and a rival administration in the east affiliated with renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar.
The GNA and Haftar’s self-styled Libyan National Army signed a “permanent ceasefire” agreement last Friday after UN-sponsored talks in Geneva.
The deal came four months after Haftar’s Emirati and Russian-backed forces abandoned their year-long attempt to seize the capital Tripoli, a battle that killed hundreds of people and displaced tens of thousands.
Dozens of Libyan delegates opened a political dialogue via videoconference on Monday as a step towards holding elections after the historic agreement.
But the ceasefire does not provide “a clear commitment and path to accountability for serious crimes” perpetrated by foreign-backed parties to the conflict, Salah noted.
“This includes indiscriminate attacks that killed civilians, destruction of critical infrastructure, disappearances, arbitrary arrests and unlawful killings,” he said.
Another “flaw”, according to the human rights group, is the absence of any commitment in the agreement to hold accountable combatants who are about to be demobilized and integrated into the state’s security forces.
On Wednesday, a committee tasked by the GNA with searching for missing persons said on its Facebook page that a dozen bodies had been unearthed in newly found mass graves in the Tarhuna region.
This brings to 98 the total number of bodies allegedly discovered in mass graves in that area since Haftar’s forces withdrew from western Libya in June.
In June, the UN Human Rights Council, with the support of the GNA, adopted a resolution calling for a fact-finding mission to be sent to the North African country to document abuses committed there by all parties since 2016.
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